The Drake equation attempts to estimate the number of intelligent civilizations in our galaxy, and its answer is either thrilling or deeply unsettling depending on the variables.

The chances of intelligent life emerging in our universe—and in any hypothetical ones beyond it—can be estimated by a new theoretical model which has echoes of the famous Drake Equation. This was the ...

Frank Drake writing his famous equation on a white board. Credit: SETI.org On November 1, 1961, a number of prominent scientists converged on the National Radio Astronomy Observatory in Green Bank, ...